ESBA: Elite Sports Business Academy Your business model · 2019-04-23 · Building confidence: Confidence happens from trust Building for the future: Future relationships, referrals

1Your business model © ESBA: Elite Sports Business Academy


VIDEO NOTES


My number one takeaway from this video


CONTENTS

Is your model sustainable? 5

Are you committed? 10

Know how to influence 13

Skills that pay the bills 19

Just do it 28

Do you know your skill set? 11

Set professional boundaries 14

Set your culture 12

Understand normal growth, development and psychology 16

Build a model that will scale 22


IS YOUR MODEL SUSTAINABLE?The fastest way to vet an idea for if your business will work is to find out five key

components:

Who you’ll serve

What problem you can solve for those you’re serving

How you’ll solve the problem

Communicating your ability to solve the problem

Collecting payment and solving the problem

But before you begin building your work, the most direct test for success or failure is to

ask:

Is the person or group I am solving problems for in big enough pain to want a solution?

Can they pay me enough to pay my bills?

Getting paid by your target customer (called your Avatar or your who) is an important

consideration for your business model. If you’re interested in serving a group that cannot

pay, then that’s not your business; it’s your cause

What is the purpose of your starting a business?


Money

Change

Helping others

How can your being in business affect change?

What social issue has your attention?


What problems do you want to help solve?

Who can you help with your experience?

Can they afford to pay you?


The most important factors to remember when establishing a business model:

Money follows value

Solve the biggest and most expensive problem(s) for people who can pay

Get paid for the transformation you bring

Avoid trading your time for dollars only. Get paid by the results you produce; the value you

provide. Value produces money.

Are you your who?

Sometimes your who is not a group but it’s a carbon copy of you. Sometimes the things

you have experienced and overcome is so personal that only you can answer the problem.

In sports, many people know the technical aspects of the game but if they’ve never been a

high-level competitor, they do not understand the physical or mental or emotional ele-

ments of the game that influence performance on the field!

How to know you’re your who

Can you create for others a product or service that you wish someone would have creat-

ed for you?


Can you help them get through a particular struggle with secrets and shortcuts you

learned by experience?

Are you willing to share your story and areas of overcoming?

Do you have any examples or stories where you’ve helped someone with one of these

areas?


ARE YOU COMMITTED? Building a business takes work. This is why athletes make the best business owners.

They’re used to being told where to show up, when to show up and what to do. And then

they get to work. But showing up in business can look different, so it’s important to know

what working for your own business team looks like:

Are you willing to work five days a week?

Are you willing to work in all types of weather?

Will you be consistent:

In your appearance?

In your timing?

In your schedule?

In your availability?

In your attitude?

Do you understand the trade of time for dollars?

Can you train different ages and levels?

When business first starts, even if you’re a recognized name, there are areas you need to

know about yourself and how others perceive you as these affect how business starts and

grows:

Novelty: The people who want to try the newest item but soon fall off because they’re

fad chasers, regardless of your ability to produce results.

Negotiation: The people who desire to negotiate pricing, whether its cultural or

financial. Knowing who you are, the value you deliver and your who will help you say

no to this from the beginning1.

Notoriety: The people who wait hours for an autograph will also want to say, “I trained

with them” as their claim to fame.

1 Allowing such ‘negotiations’ to take place is harmful to your business in the long run. Even if you work in a culture where negotiation is typical, this is not your business culture unless you choose to make it so.


DO YOU KNOW YOUR SKILL SET?When you are going to go into business to teach what you know, you must know you can

deliver results! You may be able to perform quite well, demonstrate skills and techniques

and be good with people - but at the end of the day, no one will continue to pay money for

personality. You’ve got to care about the person and produce results for them.

Skills

Can you teach?

Do you have the personality to teach / instruct?

Can you get results?

Can you demonstrate what you know?

People

Can you repeat these skills for different personality types or groups?

Can you walk in ongoing relationship with people, training them month-after-month,

year-after-year2?

When you first begin training, if you’re not sure on this, you may need to be flexible on who

you’ll train until you figure these out.

2 If you’re not sure about the answer to this question, ask family and friends. If any of the answers surprise or upset you, explore this further with a coach. These are important clues as to how you’ll handle relationships in business as well.

https://www.ascentleaderdevelopment.com


SET YOUR CULTUREAn important aspect of creating your business model is to create a business culture that

people are attracted to. Why? Because clients want to know, like and trust who they’re

working with. Important aspects of culture include:

Building trust: Trust comes from consistency

Building confidence: Confidence happens from trust

Building for the future: Future relationships, referrals and recommendations are not

made in the future; they’re made today.

Considering your personality, tolerance for risk and growth, patience for process:

What kind of culture would you like to have in your company? Encouraging? Serious?

Familial?

In relationships with clients?

With your business reputation?

What are ways you can build trust? GFT has built trust through core values like

honesty and integrity.

What kind of protection do you have in place to protect your culture? For example, a

policy in GFT is that all trainers must have background checks done each year and

training is never done in an isolated place, away from public eyes. GFT also has

protection through insurance policies (which are listed later in the course).

How will you repair damage to your company when your customer is unhappy? When

a trainer has failed to show, a session was not what the client wanted or any other

such issue, GFT instantly credits the client with a full session. Removing the financial

barrier in an effort to make amends will typically eliminate any frustration.

Keep in mind that any success in building a culture hinges on your getting results for

clients. There are many aspects to creating your business model that will influence your

success as you grow. But at the end of the day, the training and its results tell the real story:


• Physically

• Emotionally

• Relationally

• Psychologically

KNOW HOW TO INFLUENCEKey areas of a business model extend beyond your own personality and abilities into

understanding details about who you train. You may already know that you work best with

and can produce the most results for a specific age group but do you understand what

affects that age group3 ? Consider things such as:

Where are they in their development as they come to you and transition in the areas of:

Skills

Normal growth and development

Psychology

Emotions

Gender

Girls - need verbal engagement with questions: How is life?

Boys - need demonstration

What affects them culturally?

Teachability

Maturation

Family relationships

Social dynamics

3 As you grow your business, this knowledge will parlay into additional revenue streams as you learn to capture your knowledge on the field into off-field formats.


Consider your ideal client. Identify the areas that affect training for that particular age and

gender. How would these affect the training? What kind of transitions might be occurring

during the time they train with you (e.g., a boy starting middle school will be concerned

about how he appears to others; speed and agility would be a great incorporation to your

training for this age group). Once you’ve written these down, make a list below of what you

can teach to supplement your training in this areas.

SET PROFESSIONAL BOUNDARIESAn important note about boundaries. A very clear line exists between a compassionate,

involved presence versus an over-involved person. In healthcare, this is called the zone of

helpfulness and it looks like this:

ZONE OF HELPFULNESS

UNDER-INVOLVED

OVER-INVOLVED

Your professional boundaries should fall in the center area. In a professional relationship,

this looks like:

Friendly, not friends

Reachable, not readily available

Personable, not personal

Professional trainer, not counselor

Communication boundaries


Physical contact boundaries

Personal boundaries

Ethical boundaries

The good news is that when training, opportunities should be limited for talking as the

focus is on the progression in training.

Warning signs of unprofessional interactions / poorly established boundaries:

Calling a client a friend

Sharing personal life moments regularly

Discussion of personal issues

Anxiety over client personal issues

Discussion of clients outside of work

Client interaction outside the trainer role (e.g., babysitting, dinner, rides home)

Letting clients know in the beginning how to contact you, hours of response and more will

establish clear boundary lines. GFT scheduling is typically done through email or text. But

the content is strictly related to training and schedule availability and contact is done with

client permission and not facilitated outside professional interactions.

Avoid sharing personal details unless it’s to encourage a client. This keeps the focus on

the client, not on you as a trainer. If you interact with clients outside the training arena, be

friendly but professional. Lead the conversation so they understand what’s acceptable or

not. You can always tailor this to be age and situation-appropriate.

Finally, be accountable. If you find that you’re more sensitive regarding inquiries around

a client or relationship, this is a warning sign. You should be on guard for yourself, your

emotions, your client’s emotions, your business, family and more. If you find yourself in this

situation, reach out for help and support immediately. The best option is to put boundaries

in place to avoid this scenario completely.

https://www.ascentleaderdevelopment.com


GFT example of communication

A great example of establishing two-way boundaries and protection is when Jeremie is

communicating with a wife via text about training a child, or a college female client, he

texts “See you guys later at the fields.” He does not text, “I”ll see you later at the fields” This

simple tweak in language protects GFT and Jeremie by avoiding over-personalization and

protects the client from misinterpretation or from a jealous spouse.

UNDERSTAND NORMAL GROWTH, DEVELOPMENT AND PSYCHOLOGYDeveloping the youth is the most recommended training model. There is more opportuni-

ty, more money and more need. Training the professionals is great except you’re on their

schedule, at their demand. This means you may train at 3 a.m. The price points may be

higher but the schedule is less flexible and the pool of opportunity is smaller4. Training at

the collegiate level solely limits your income potential and you’ll need to live near a heav-

ily populated college sports town. Training the youth gives you flexibility of age caps (e.g.,

won’t train below a certain age or above a certain level) and level of play. However, there

are some basic considerations you should know by age and gender that affect your train-

ing:

Ages 6-7

Boys: Some, even ages 8-9, have what Jeremie calls ‘superman syndrome.’ This is a

false bravado that makes teaching more challenging. They don’t like to appear to

not have mastered the content and therefore can be disruptive.

Girls: The opposite of superman syndrome; girls this age are good listeners, hard

workers and not embarrassed to learn.

4 An interesting note: Some trainers claim to ‘train the pros’ - and they do - but the payment is going to the professional athletes for a day of filmed training to be used as a promotion for selling the trainer’s digital products or in-person training. This is dishonest and this model is not sustainable. This is paid sponsorship or affiliate marketing represented as an ongoing relationship. Avoid this practice.


Age 10

Boys can be honest with themselves and the trainer. They recognize that they need

to practice or they give up because they can’t take temporary failure. Girls

at this age begin to get more embarrassed when they mess up. This age group really

needs a trainer who will be an encourager.

Ages 12-13

Both genders start to get attitude of ‘I already know this and I’m already good at it.’

They don’t understand they’re not that good, that they can improve and

the importance of continued development. In particular due

to natural body growth and development, they may not see improvement as quickly

due to the gaps in growth, causing frustration.

Ages 14+

Both genders start to recognize they know they want to play college; those who

don’t won’t try in practice as much. The pairing of the highly motivated is

challening as they want to improve. Finding a team with equally motivated groups

can be challenging. The trainer should always encourage these players to continue

to train on their own as they grow because when teammates fail to

try as hard, it lowers their game mentally and technically.

If you do want to train youth, focus on ages 9-13 for your marketing. This is the largest

group of kids who do extra training. Ages 8 and under, parents think they’re still young and

want to save money. Because most sports get more serious around age 10, this is the happy

medium because the kids begin having to make the team, they’re not automatically on the

team. Around ages 14+ the kids begin to check out.

If you do want to train college kids wanting to go pro: go to conventions. Go to where

colleges already are to reduce their costs and get in with college coaches. This will be more

difficult to make a living because typically college students are broke, are already really

good, and not many will pay to do some training. However some will pay to train or their

parents will.


If you do want to train the pros, the biggest advantage is that you can get paid well for

your time. But you’ll need the reputation, the skills and the ability to produce results. The

biggest factor will be the players themselves. For this group, you’ll need to focus more on

position-specific training. Things such as working with defenders on skills because they’re

typically not as skillful. You will not focus as much on speed and agility; players do strength

training on their own. Instead you’ll be more technically heavy with high reps.

Who will you train?

What age groups?


Why are you interested in developing this group in particular?

SKILLS THAT PAY THE BILLSPlayers need more than encouragement. You’ve got to meet their schedule. You need

an eye for technique, how to read the player’s body language. These two components,

technique plus correct assessment of player development psychologically and physically,

can make a player comfortable as training is an additional high-anxiety for many players.

Correct reading and assessment reduces stress and opens them up to understand you,

themselves and their needs. How? It shows them that you know your stuff: how to train

and get results based on them, not on you. This is the secret to a successful business model!

It’s not the skills that made Jeremie a professional soccer player; it’s the dedication,

understanding speed of play, understanding importance of first-touch, receiving, passing,

doing all things perfectly under pressure and being professional.

Reasons athletes will continue to train

Growth and development (physical or emotional)

Confidence

Position changes

Goals


Playing time

Longevity - set the routine to get better as a habit

Psychology

Reasons players will continue to train with you

Successful trainers include psychology and professionalism in their training. But it begins

with work ethic. Never stand around. Be engaged. Pass the ball, shag balls. Do not be lazy.

Otherwise, they’re doing stuff they could do themselves. Players are coming to you for the

things they shouldn’t be able to do solo.

When a player first arrives, ask them how life is. Make eye contact for 2-3 seconds

to indicate genuine interest and then look away, using only intermittent eye contact

afterwards, especially with the youth males. Some groups may engage with more eye

contact if seeking your opinion or thoughts on a specific topic. This is normal and you can

engage accordingly.

Personality matters. When players mess up, encourage them. NEVER get angry with them.

NEVER make fun of them. Even if the same mistake has been repeated four or five times

in a row, do not get frustrated. But be honest with them or they may get more upset. This

truthfulness will help them to trust you more and grow in confidence more quickly. Admit

they need to improve, tell them to forget about the mistakes and to focus on the good

results.

Players know when they’re messing up. A good trainer can read the player’s body language

and facial expressions more easily too because they’re 3 yards away versus 20 yards away.

Keep it professional! Don’t watch the player’s face. Watch their mechanics. This promotes

their comfort and trust as well.

Don’t hesitate to call out the voice in their head that starts lying with each mistake, as this

affects their confidence.


GFT example about confidence

Each training camp, Jeremie will divide players into two groups for competition, sometimes

intentionally stacking one group with stronger players. After a few rounds of play, when

the score reflects the stacking, Jeremie will tell the weaker group, “I have a feeling you guys

are about to win this round; have a big comeback.” To the stronger group he’ll say, “I think

you’re going to do bad this round.” Regardless of age, you can physically see the deflation

happen in the stronger group and the confidence rise in that of the weaker. And typically,

the weaker group wins. This leads to his explanation of the influence of psychology on their

game, how to combat it, use it and more.

Try to end each session with something that boosts confidence or makes training fun. This

applies even to the collegiate and professional levels. This lets the player end on a good

note and leave with the experience of some positive psychology. They will be excited to

come back and more confident in their skills too.

Will your model make money

You must be able to charge for your services; does the group you want to help have the

money to pay you for your services? Jeremie developed youth because he saw how much

money parents are willing to invest in their kids, knew he could produce rapid development

and he had a desire to influence kids to make good choices throughout their life. Core

training services for GFT include:

Private 1:1 lessons

Small group training (max of 4-6 players)

Large group training (teams and by level)

Camps

Clinics

GFT pricing example

Don’t get discouraged by the pricing in your area. When Jeremie first started training,

the most a trainer got paid for private lessons at the youth level in Texas, California or

Washington D.C. was $35 an hour. But Jeremie had the pedigree, the experience and the


results. Other players soon copied the rate, allowing Jeremie to continue raising his prices.

This worked to his advantage because he could produce results and raised infrequently,

grandfathering clients for many years on their original pricing point, so long as they stayed

consistent. Set the standard for your own business and model5 .

BUILD A MODEL THAT WILL SCALEUsing your Strengthsfinders assessment results from your bonus download, evaluate the

following questions about your business model:

5 Pricing is not a number you favor; the financial demographics of your region must support your pricing structure. More on this in later lessons.

What are you good at?

What can you sustain?


6 A simple example: If you were a linebacker in college and gained 200 pounds after school and have now lost 160 pounds and kept it off, that could be a business model for you. Helping former athletes who need to lose more than 100 pounds and keep it off. Your upsells could then be for personal coaching, membership motivation and accountability and for meal plans.

Are there any experiences you could turn into a product or service6?

Look at your past and your experiences. Which of those did you overcome? Could you

teach someone else to overcome those same issues, thus providing a shortcut in their

development time?


Who do you have a heart for?

Who do you want to help and why?

What parts of your story make you uniquely qualified to address

this subject / give you authority?


What are the pain points they have?

What subject do friends and family often ask you for advice regarding?

What victories have your achieved in you life, personally or professionally? Can you

teach someone else about what you experienced so they can overcome faster?


Jeremie had self-belief, a proven product and results. These gave him authority and confi-

dence. He has been able to use all of his story to affect lives ever since, including issues of

Race

Fatherlessness

Lack of stability

Lack of training

No mentorship

What makes you unique?


The GFT map

The GFT product line

The GFT product line expanded to include the following products and services:

Online courses and programs

Online training

College prep

Pro prep

Ball control training x 5 levels

Headers and concussions training

Nutrition guide


Injury recovery guide

A training membership

Player psychology and mentorship / training around mental toughness and sports

maturity

A VIP group

Players flying from out of state to train

Jeremie flying out of state to run camps and clinics - for higher rates per hour

JUST DO IT

Choose a sports platform

Identify your clients


Keep your clients7

Set your script: You’re going to _____________ (e.g., have fun, improve, work hard, build

confidence, etc).

Build a practical, sustainable platform around relationships - that’s how you scale.

How can you do this based on your personality?

7 Desperate businesses pressure their clients; successful ones nurture the ones they have.


Identify what role you want to play in people’s lives; how do you want to be known

by reputation?

Test the model

Go train someone8. Consider the following evaluations:

How well does what you do translate to someone else?

Include the basics, mechanics, fundamentals, psychology.

Were you able to bring them improvement in 30 minutes?

Were you able to train for more than 30 minutes? Try to train for 55

minutes of content.

Get their feedback

Based on your experience

8 Ideally, this would be someone who you know through a connection but not a personal relationship. Let them know that you’ll train them in exchange for their honest feedback either directly or through your mutual connections.


What services might you offer?

Can you sustain them?

How many hours can you train in a row?


How is your attitude? Do you need to watch out for low blood sugar, restroom

breaks? Hydration?


Documents

ESBA: Elite Sports Business Academy Your business model · 2019-04-23 · Building confidence: Confidence happens from trust Building for the future: Future relationships, referrals